Financing a tourism business on the Gold Coast in 2026

The Gold Coast's tourism-dependent business sector faces a financing environment that has evolved significantly since the pandemic, as the major banks' experience of tourism business loan defaults during the COVID closure period has introduced more conservative lending criteria for hospitality, accommodation, and tourism experience businesses that persist even as the sector's performance has recovered to record levels.

Major bank lending to tourism and hospitality businesses on the Gold Coast now typically requires more substantial security, higher equity contributions from owners, and demonstrated trading history of two or more post-COVID profitable years before they will lend at pre-pandemic leverage levels. Tourism business owners who financed at high leverage before 2020 found their facilities reviewed during the pandemic; the banks' response has been to apply more conservative structuring to new facilities in the sector that reflects the demonstrated capacity for revenue to fall to near-zero in an extended disruption.

Non-bank alternatives are increasingly filling the gap, with several specialist hospitality and tourism lenders having entered the market since 2021 that provide equipment finance, working capital facilities, and property-secured business loans at competitive rates with more sector-specific assessment methodologies. These lenders assess tourism business risk differently from the major banks, considering the Gold Coast's structural tourism demand, the specific operator's customer base and booking patterns, and the sector's recovery trajectory in their credit analysis.

The Small Business Finance Guarantee Scheme — in which the federal government guarantees a proportion of eligible SME loans, reducing the lender's risk and encouraging them to lend to businesses that might otherwise fall outside credit criteria — has been particularly relevant for Gold Coast tourism businesses seeking finance to invest in business improvement and expansion following the COVID recovery period.

This article was compiled by AI from the sources linked above and screened before publishing. See our editorial standards.